


we're not damaged goods

by Rebellion042



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Fluff, M/M, More space gays, a little angsty, is anyone surprised
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-21
Updated: 2016-02-21
Packaged: 2018-05-22 08:52:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,889
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6073006
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rebellion042/pseuds/Rebellion042
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The aftermath of the Battle of Starkiller Base.</p>
            </blockquote>





	we're not damaged goods

**Author's Note:**

> So, this was just sitting in my folder wihout me realizing. More space gays! Also, check out the title song [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FiKXjTUESPo).

_PaincoldburningReydarkness_

Finn sits up and hits his head on the bottom of the bunk above him.

“Ow,” he says, still half-asleep.

He knots the sheets around his hands, tying all the different kinds he’s been taught. It helps him clear his mind, ground himself in the present.

He takes deep breaths, counts to ten, reminds himself where he is. Everything the medical officers told him to do to help with the frequent panic attacks.

_You are on D’Qar, in the rebel base. You are not on Starkiller. Rey is safe with Luke Skywalker._

He widens his eyes, straining to see in the darkness. He forgot to leave on his holo like he usually does. He knows it’s stupid, but darkness reminds him of the three-week coma he was in after the fight on Starkiller.

He swings his legs off of the bed and leans his elbows on his knees, lacing his fingers.

It’s always worse with Poe gone.

Until Finn is fully recovered (he tries to convince everyone he is), he can’t go on missions. But Poe can, and Finn always feels his absence from their room.

He hums a bit of an old Yavin song he’d heard Poe singing, and reaches towards the desk to get the holo. As he turns it on, the door opens with a soft _hiss_.

Finn tries to stand up, surprised, but hits his head on the bunk again. “Damn it!”

“Whoa, Finn. I thought you’d be asleep,” Poe’s voice says from the doorway. Finn relaxes.

“I couldn’t sleep. How’d the mission go?”

“Fine,” Poe replies. “I could have lived without the TIE fighters shooting half of our squad down, though.”

“Ouch.”

“Yeah.” Poe switches the lights on and Finn’s eyes water.

After his eyes adjust, Finn looks at Poe.

He looks terrible.

His flight suit is stained and charred, he has several cuts and bruises on his face, dark shadows under his eyes, and grease in his hair.

“If this is what you look like after a mission is ‘fine’, I’d hate to see you after a bad one.”

“Thanks,” Poe says, dropping his helmet on the desk. He runs a hand through his hair before  
looking at Finn.

“…We’re in pretty bad shape, aren’t we?” he says after a minute.

Finn snorts. “More or less,” he responds.

Poe grabs clothes and his towel. “I’m going to shower before anyone can yell at me for being noisy this late.”

He walks out. Finn doesn’t turn the light off.

*

When Poe comes back to find Finn in the same position with knotted sheets pooled around him, he sighs and sits down next to him.

The mission really wasn’t the best, but a) it could have been worse and b) Finn obviously needs to talk.

“You should talk to someone, Finn. It doesn’t have to be me, but you need to get this out.”

“It’s fine—” Finn starts to say.

“No, it isn’t. Because I hear you tossing and turning every night and when you’re not awake, you’re having nightmares.”

“Talking about it won’t make it go away,” he says to the floor.

“From experience? It won’t. But it can help you cope,” Poe replies. Finn picks at one of the knots.

“I’m not sure there’s a way to cope, Poe. You try having him inside your head all the time.”

“He is,” Poe says. Neither of them says his name.

Finn looks up, realization and shame dawning on his face. “I’m sorry, I didn’t—”

“—Finn, it’s fine.” And it is. He understands. “But you’re not the only one who knows what you’re going through, okay? Think about it.”

Poe claps his shoulder and stands up, about to go to bed.

Finn grabs his hand. “Poe—“

“—Yeah?” He tries to ignore the way his heart speeds up.

“…Thanks,” Finn says, and there’s something warm in his eyes.

He squeezes Finn’s hand. “No problem,” he says, and climbs into bed.

He falls asleep with the ghost of Finn’s hand warm on his.

*

When Poe leaves in the morning, Finn half wakes up. The sheets are wrinkled and free of knots.

“You going on another mission?” he says. Poe looks at him.

“Yeah,” he replies. “After breakfast. I probably won’t see you until tomorrow afternoon.”

“Always sleep better when you’re here,” Finn mumbles into his pillow. When he blinks at Poe  
blearily, the pilot’s eyes are crinkly from his smile.

Poe walks to Finn and kisses him on the forehead. “I’ll be back before you know it, I promise.”

“Still,” Finn mutters, but he’s placated.

Before leaving, Poe says, “I sleep better when you’re here, too.”

Finn doesn’t have nightmares all morning.

 

He spends the day giving the rebels all the intel he can dig out of his brain about the First Order, which is quite a lot, and by the time dinner rolls around, he’s exhausted. He knows there’s more, so he’ll be back in command first thing tomorrow.

When he goes to bed, he leaves the holo on and tries to ignore the empty bed above him.

He still doesn’t sleep.

He turns on the holo’s 3-dimensional map of the Core Worlds. The planets that Starkiller destroyed are still there, along with the stars and moons.

Finn can’t quite wrap his head around how much he doesn’t know of the galaxy.

The map rotates slowly, and he watches it from his bed until exhaustion closes his eyes.

 

He wakes to a violent shake from someone he doesn’t know. He reacts out of instinct and takes them down, rolling out of bed and pinning them to the ground.

It’s a kid a little younger than he is, in a cadet’s uniform.

Finn stands up.

“I’m sorry,” he says, and makes knots in the sheets on Poe’s bed, but it doesn’t stop his pounding heart.

The cadet coughs once. “Poe Dameron came back. I was sent to get you.”

Wait, what? “Why isn’t he here?”

“He’s in the medbay,” she croaks.

Finn doesn’t hear the rest of her sentence. He sprints down the hall to the medbay.

Poe is on one of the cots, med-droids hovering over him that push Finn back when he tries to get close.

He settles for a chair to the left of the bed, all-too-reminiscent of three weeks earlier, when their positions had been reversed.

The med-droids tell him it’s not serious.

The pallor of Poe’s skin says otherwise.

Finn grips his hand like a lifeline.

*

Poe doesn’t know where he is.

He stops the panic in its tracks and makes a list of what he knows.

_I was on a mission for the Rebel Alliance. It was a surveillance mission to a high-security First Order planet. I was shot down._

He doesn’t remember anything else.

Poe opens his eyes.

He’s looking at the ceiling of the medbay on D’Qar.

“What the hell?” he tries to say, but all that comes out is a croak.

"Poe!" He looks to his left.

Finn.

He realizes Finn's hand is wrapped around his, warm and _alive_ , and Poe’s _alive_ , and it's pretty much the best feeling to wake up to.

"Finn—" he starts, but med officers are descending and pushing Finn away, separating their hands, and Poe doesn't get the chance or the courage to say what he wants.

 

While Poe recovers in the medbay for three days, Finn regales him with stories of Jess and Snap's adventures in the short time they'd been back.

"It's not the same without you, though," he says on the third day, sitting in the chair next to Poe's bed. His thumb traces shapes and words on the back of Poe's hand.

"I should be discharged sometime tomorrow."

Finn smiles. "I know. It'll be good to have you back." His face falls slightly. "I'm still having nightmares. But now..."

"Now...what?"

Finn looks down. "They involve losing you."

Poe swallows the lump in his throat. "Finn..."

“—Sorry. I'm sorry. That was weird."

"No, no, Finn..."

He looks up, almost challenging, waiting for Poe to finish.

"I have nightmares about losing you, too."

A med-droid walks in, prattling on about Poe's condition, and they look away. Poe can feel his cheeks getting hot.

"...Discharge at 1900 hours," the droid is saying, and Finn looks up in amazement.

"You're kidding," Poe says, delighted.

"I am not programmed to joke," the droid says dryly.

*

Finn pulls Poe through the hallways to their room. "This is so great," he says, redundant.

Poe laughs. He hasn't said anything about the mission, but he didn't look all that bad when he came back—aside from a mild concussion and bruising.

But Finn feels like something is wrong that he can't see, can't help.

He doesn't loosen his grip on Poe's hand when the door to their room opens, and suddenly he's falling on the bottom bunk with Poe on top of him.

"Sorry," Poe laughs, but Finn's heart is racing as Poe makes as if to climb up the ladder. He grabs Poe's hand again.

Pulls him into the bottom bunk until they're lying, side-by-side, noses almost touching.

"I'm sorry," Finn whispers.

Poe's eyebrows contract. "For...?"

"You felt like that for three weeks, didn't you?"

Sighing, Poe says, "Finn. That wasn't your fault. And this was only partially mine."

"I know, but..."

Poe's hand strokes his cheek. "Is it so hard to let people worry about you without you thinking it's your fault?"

Finn closes his eyes. Poe has a point, and he is so, _so_ tired of apologizing for existing.

"Force of habit," he says, and Poe's laugh is warm breath against his face before his lips are there.

Finn breathes into the kiss, every muscle in his body relaxing as Poe's other arm drapes around his shoulders.

"I'm really glad you're not dead," Poe says against his lips. "For a few weeks there, I was starting to worry."

Finn stays close enough for their noses to touch. "I could say the same to you," he says. "Only I only had to think that for two days."

“It still _matters_ , Finn—”

“—I know,” he replies, and tilts forward an inch to kiss Poe again.

*

The next morning, Poe is late to the briefing for the new mission, and his squadron is suited up and ready.

They whistle and cheer when he comes into view, albeit mockingly, and Snap yells, “Look at Poe, getting ac- _tion_!” 

Poe laughs because that’s not even the case—he and Finn fell asleep somewhere between kissing and talking—and is about to reply with a _more than you'll ever get_ when he sees the general.

He clears his throat as his pilots suddenly find other places to be.

“General Organa, ma’am, I—” he starts, but she holds up a hand.

“—Poe, it’s fine,” she says.

He has to make sure he’s heard right. “What?”

“You needed some sleep,” she says knowingly, and gestures to Jess to brief him instead.

Jess smirks at him as the general calls over her shoulder, “And I bet that boyfriend of yours does a lot of good, too!”

All in all, Poe figures sleeping in was worth it.

Especially when he gets back from the mission and Finn’s waiting for him, kissing him fiercely as if it’s the most normal thing in the world.

Especially when Finn pulls back and says, “Boyfriend, huh?”

**Author's Note:**

> As always, thanks to my beta [Rominey](http://romnomn0m.tumblr.com/). Love ya!


End file.
